reality check.

i had the privilage a few weeks ago to head up to camp whittier in the santa ynez mountains with a bunch of westmont's first year students. it was such a sweet time. we laughed. we climbed, zip-lined, hiked and play with trantulas. we prayed, listened, and talked. we learned. and we came together to worship our creator together. we got a reality check. it was so encouraging to be around all that spunk and zeal (as if i am old and decripet at the age of 21). i was so blessed by the weekend. click here for a slideshow of my favorite photographs from the weekend.

i hope to get some pics up soon, but i don't have a solid internet connection right now. so in the meantime, here is a little antecdote about something the Lord showed me during my quiet time on sunday morning...

I wrestled my way through the underbrush, as fallen oak leaves cracked and crunched beneath my sneakers in pursuit of a place to be alone and to be in nature. I sat for a few moments perched on a small rock on the banks of a waterless creek. I noticed a faint breath of wind as the leaves in the tree tops quivered. One detached itself from the life-giving tree branch and swirled its deadly way to the ground whose surface was coated with the corpses of many a fallen leaf. I picked it up. I explored it with eye and hand and nose and then sat perplexed by its simplicity and by its complexity all at the same time. So I thought about the leaf and journaled a bit and distracted myself with thoughts of mind.

“Stop writing. Get in the creek bed. Being on the banks is not enough. Lay down on the rocks. Be quiet. Listen. Be still and close your eyes.”

I said, “but Lord, there is no water. It’s dry.”

So attention was thus promptly turned to the creek bed. It was small, and it was dry. It seems as if no water had filled to its banks in several weeks if not several months. I was compelled to climb down into it. Then I sprawled myself out in the middle of the creek bed on the cobbled stone and piles of fallen leaves. It was awfully uncomfortable, though the interspersed pillows of leaves provided some comfort. I laid there a while and gazed at the leaf-laden branches of tree and the deep blue sky above. I heard the birds chattering with each other and frolicking about the playground above.

“The water will come my son. Wait and be patient. It will come and then you will be ready. Just wait and be still. It will come.”

I do not like to wait. I want to know now. I want the water to come now. What good is a creek without water? How sad is that? So lifeless. So boring. So dry and barren. Well, that is what I thought initially. But now is see it differently. The creek bed as waiting—waiting to be filled with the life-giving waters. Waiting for its purpose to be fulfilled, to be carried out and realized. It just waited. It had no choice really, yet it "knows" that water will come eventually. It does every year. The waters come and bring life to the valleys. Something that is dry and still for a season is literally swimming with life in another. I thought more about the stillness of the creek. Although life was abundant in the forest around it, there was nonetheless as overwhelming and holistic sense of stillness. This was intriguing. How can there be life, movement and growth in the stillness? Is not that contrary to the very definition of the word? Perhaps it is more than just a physical lack of movement, but it is a state of spiritual, mental or internal being. It is a choice, an action. It takes the work of the mind, the heart, the body and the soul. It is a state of being. Oh, there is so much to learn about stillness from nature; I am full of awe and amazement right now.